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Mark Moran / The Citizens' VOice
Hugo Selenski was transferred to the State Correctional Institution at Mahanoy in Schuylkill County on Monday.

Hugo Selenski is out of the Luzerne County Correctional Facility.

In fact, he's out of Luzerne County altogether.

The 39-year-old double-homicide suspect has been transferred to the State Correctional Institution at Mahanoy in Schuylkill County, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Corrections said Tuesday.

Selenski entered the Frackville prison Monday, days after a Luzerne County judge ordered him removed from the Luzerne County Correctional Facility, from where he famously escaped in 2003 using bedsheets.

Prosecutors recently filed a motion that asked the judge to remove Selenski, arguing he is a state inmate who should be serving his time in state prison.

In September 2009, Selenski was sentenced to 32½ to 65 years in state prison for a Monroe County home invasion and robbery.

Selenski had been allowed to stay at the county prison to prepare for his double-homicide trial in Luzerne County court. He is slated to stand trial for the 2002 killings of pharmacist Michael Kerkowski and his girlfriend, Tammy Fassett, whose bodies were found buried in the yard of Selenski's Kingston Township home.

The much-delayed trial, which was last scheduled to start in September, is again on hold, pending a defense appeal to the state Supreme Court.

At a hearing last week, Selenski's attorney Shelley Centini argued that it would significantly harm the defense's ability to prepare for trial if Selenski was moved out of the county jail.

In previous stints in state prison, Selenski has been incarcerated at SCI-Mahanoy, but also at the two state prisons in Luzerne County - SCI-Dallas and SCI-Retreat.

Selenski's "home" prison in the state system is SCI-Forest, but he is being held as close as possible to Luzerne County because of his pending criminal case, said Susan McNaughton, spokeswoman for the state Department of Corrections.

bkalinowski@citizensvoice.com

570-821-2055, @cvbobkal

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